


Double Ninth

by rivendellrose



Category: Firefly
Genre: Gen, Team as Family
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-01
Updated: 2017-01-01
Packaged: 2018-09-13 20:00:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,389
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9140077
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rivendellrose/pseuds/rivendellrose
Summary: A brief respite on a friendly station.Originally posted on Livejournal in October of 2007.





	

“I never said we were stayin’ all day for this, Kaylee. Zoe, tell her I never said we was stayin’.”

Zoe looked measuringly first at Kaylee, then at her captain. “Never said we weren’t, either.” 

“You... hey, now! You’re supposed to be on my side!”

“I just can’t see any harm in it, sir. We got the parts we need, got the supplies, Kaylee’s done all her repairs...”

“Yeah, so we should be shovin’ off this tin can and back into the black where we belong! No offense,” Mal offered with a big grin at an officious looking gentleman who looked askance at him after hearing that last sentence. “No sense hanging around just for... just for...”

“A holiday, sir?” Zoe crossed her arms and watched Mal closely. “We ain’t had a rest in months. This station is as friendly as any, and we just happened to dock during a real festival. I can’t see any harm in us all having a little fun.”

“Your husband put you up to this, didn’t he?”

“He might’a said something about wanting to watch the kites,” Zoe allowed. “And I might’a wanted to let him. But it’s _your_ decision, sir...”

“There something you ain’t telling me, Zoe?”

“Only I know Inara’s already taken Simon and River to get treats for a picnic,” she explained calmly, “and Book is out having a little conference with some other shepherds and religious folk. Also, Jayne’s bet ten credits on one of the kites, and as much as I’d love to listen to him grouse if we leave without him seeing the end of the game, we’re gonna have a hell of a time dragging him out of the viewing gallery with his feet still attached.”

“So what you’re saying...” Mal spoke slowly, thinking this through. “Is that even if I decided for sure that we _ain’t_ stayin’ for this thing, I’d have to take at least three hours to round everybody up, and by that point I might just as well have sat for the rest of the damned festival and eaten some annoying little sweets while I’m doing it. Is that right?”

“Just about, sir. Plus, Kaylee just snuck off into that crowd while you were talking to me.”

“Ah.” Mal stucks his hands in his pockets, rocked back on his heels for a minute, and seemed to be inspecting the lighting fixtures. “Couldn’t’a said something about that _before_ she got out’a sight, could you, Zoe?”

“Girl moves fast when she wants to.” Zoe shrugged. “Besides, I got a husband gonna be real disappointed if he don’t see the kites.”

“Uh-huh. So where’s this picnic Inara’s putting together gonna be, then?”

* * *

“Back home, we always had crab for Double Ninth,” Simon said. “Broiled in the morning, and then carried in our basket to the hill. Remember that, River?”

“Little legs trying to climb out of the pot. They screamed while the water painted them red...” River lifted her head from poking around in the basket Inara had bought. “I like the _teng-kao_ cakes better.”

“That’s good...” Inara reached delicately around the younger woman and pulled out a bottle delicately wrapped in basketry. “Kaylee, did you bring the cups like I asked?”

“We got drink?”

“Not for you, Jayne.” Inara accepted the little cups Kaylee handed her, and carefully unstopped the little bottle. 

“Why not me?”

“Because you’ve already drunk enough to power a small rocket,” Wash put in, circling back from the window during a less-than-thrilling moment between kite battles. “And because we’d rather not be kicked out before the game’s over.”

It was true, Mal thought - now that they were settled, even he would rather stick around and watch the show. Thanks to Inara’s quick thinking (and, admittedly, also to her diplomacy and gracious manners) the crew had managed to snag not a bad spot at all for watching the kites out the big gallery windows. And these weren’t the flimsy little paper diamonds he’d once or twice had occasion to play with back on the ranch on Shadow - these were huge constructions of the finest metal sheet, brightly painted and arrayed over delicate frameworks in the shapes of dragons and lions, frogs and butterflies and, in one particularly spectacular but not terribly mobile case, a giant whale. 

Each kite was maneuvered by four or five tiny shuttles with one pilot a piece, tethered to a single portion of the larger armature (hence Wash’s intense interest in the proceeding - the flightwork involved was damned impressive even to Mal’s inexperienced eye). To make matters a bit more exciting, each of these tethers was specially designed so as to sever any other cable it came into contact with. One kite had already gone sailing off into space, having lost all its tethers, and another was hanging on by only two remaining lines. Jayne, too, was in high spirits. The kite he’d bet his money on - one shaped like a giant rooster - was still well in the running with three of its four original tethers still attached.

Inara had just begun to pour some kind of liquor into the little cups Kaylee’d brought, and Mal allowed himself to be momentarily distracted by the elegant curve of her hand, the way she smiled and gently teased River while she went about her work... When suddenly the whole pretty picture was ruined by Jayne shouting and flailing his arms. 

“Rutting _gôushî bùrú_ idiots!” 

The rooster kite had lost two more strings at a single blow from a kite shaped like a giant carp. 

“Gorram sonofa-- _whoa!_ ” 

Pottery crashed to the metal deckplates and shattered as Jayne’s wayward arm knocked five of the nine cups off Inara’s tray. River squealed and caught the remaining four much more quickly than Mal figured anybody ought to have been able to move, and Inara herself held tightly to her bottle of high-class booze, giving Jayne a look of sheer death.

“Everybody alright?” Book gently relieved River of the cups, patting her hair distractedly as she stared wide-eyed around, the sound apparently having knocked her out of the semi-cogency they’d all been enjoying from their little crazy girl that day. “There, see, River? Everyone’s fine...”

Jayne’s complaints died down to a mutter under Inara’s fierce eye, while Kaylee bent to examine the damage. “None of these are gonna be usable, now, ‘Nara,” she murmured, gathering shards of pottery into her hands and tucking them away in a nearby disposal unit. 

“We’ll make do,” Zoe put in firmly. “Wash and I can share, and Simon and River, and...” She hesitated, looking at the remaining cups. 

“And Jayne don’t get any,” Kaylee put in with a dark look at the mercenary. 

Jayne stormed off, grumbling, probably to find someone to take out his frustrations on. Mal shook his head and watched him go. They didn’t have cash to be bailing the man out of holding, so he’d better at least have the sense to win anything he started, and not leave anybody conscious to press charges til after they’d left. 

“Mal.” 

He turned, surprised, and found Inara at his elbow, holding out the last of the little cups. The wine was palest pink, with tiny little flower petals floating in it. 

“Y’got something in there...” 

“They’re chrysanthemum petals, Mal. For long life.” She gave him an exasperated look. “They’re supposed to be there.”

“Oh.” He looked around their small cluster. Wash had laid back, head leaned on Zoe’s thigh as he watched the gallery window with bright, delighted eyes while she threaded the fingers of one hand through his hair, holding their shared cup aloft in the other. River and Kaylee sat on either side of Simon, all three bickering good-naturedly about whether or not River was old enough to have strong wine, holiday or no, while Book stood nearby and sipped from his cup with a mild, paternal smile. One cup, two, three... “That’s the last one? Nah, you... you take it, I... y’know, gotta keep an eye on...”

“Just drink, Mal. There’s only about two sips’ worth in these things, anyway. Especially with how you drink.”

Mal wasn’t quite sure, but he thought she smiled as he raised the cup in salute to her, took the smallest of sips, and offered it back to her. Maybe Jayne was good for something, after all...

**Author's Note:**

> (All information on Double Ninth, an actual holiday on the Chinese calendar, is taken from _The Folklore of World Holidays_ , 2nd ed, edited by Griffin and Shurgin. It’s a lovely, very useful book.)


End file.
